Mount Pisgah Monument

The site of Mount Pisgah (Iowa) is now marked by a nine-acre (3.6 ha) Mount Pisgah Cemetery State Preserve, which contains the 12-foot high obelisk, exhibits, historical markers, and a reconstructed log cabin. However, little remains from the 19th century except a cemetery memorializing the those emigrants who died while passing through or residing in the community.

While sign states the loss of 300-800 souls, only about 60 are listed on the monument, about 92 are identified with FindAGrave, so that actual fatality rate maybe only about 150. Many of those interned in this region are listed on Mount Pisgah Monument.

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The creation of this monument in 1888 denotes this place as the first historical landmark of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and predates any other historical site preservation efforts. It is now part of their Mormon Trail series of landmarks.

The community had been beset by illness. Many Saints, in their weakened condition following months of rigorous travel, died while at Mount Pisgah. Although estimates vary, at least 80 people died within their first year of residence. The cemetery at the top of the hill likely includes the graves of about 150 Latter-day Saints, although only 63 names are listed on the monument. William Huntington, the community’s first branch president, is among those buried there, as is Joseph Knight, a close associate and early supporter of Joseph Smith. Children were particularly vulnerable. The infant children of two future Apostles were laid to rest in the cemetery: Leonora Charlotte Snow (1847-1847), six-month-old daughter of Lorenzo and Charlotte Squires Snow, and Isaac Phineas Richards (1846-1846), son of Franklin D. and Jane Snyder Richards, who died the same day he was born. While friends and family continued to mourn their loved ones, most people forgot the cemetery as Latter-day Saints abandoned the wagon road across Iowa in favor of other routes.

In 1846 members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon)
began their historic trek from Nauvoo, Illinois, to the Great Salt Lake
Basin of the Rocky Mountains. Having been cruelly driven from their homes
in Nauvoo, they settled Mount Pisgah, Iowa, while preparing for the western
trek. The name was given to this locality by Apostle Parley P. Pratt.
Mormon leader Brigham Young arrived here May 18, 1846. Soon after,
temporary farms were sectioned off and planting began. Other migrating
Mormons quickly arrived in this community until the population had swelled
to over 2,000. The mortality rate was quite high due to exposure and
hardship suffered as the result of being driven from Illinois. Over 150
persons died here during the first six months.

In July of 1846 the Church was called upon by the Federal Government to
raise 500 young men to march to Mexico and participate in the war being
conducted there. Brigham Young himself acted as temporary recruiting
officer under the authority of United States Army officers. Losing many of
Mount Pisgah's able-bodied men placed an even greater hardship on those who
remained. Nevertheless, in the fall of 1846 it was reported the Mormons at
Mount Pisgah were "enjoying peas, cucumbers, and beans; that corn had silked
out and buckwheat was in flower. There was a good prospect for crops of
potatoes, melons, pumpkins, and squash."

In 1852 this settlement was abandoned. The Latter-day Saints were advised
by Church leaders in Utah to unite there with the rest of their people. A
granite shaft has been raised over the old cemetery and upon it are engraved
the names of those pioneers who gave their lives during the great Mormon
exodus west.